Tunis: At least 37 people, mostly foreigners, were killed and 36 others injured on Friday when gunmen opened indiscriminate fire in Tunisia’s resort town of Sousse, the country’s interior ministry said.
Tunisia’s Interior Ministry told NBC News that most of the victims were foreigners and that at least 37 people had been injured in the attack on the beaches of Sousse.
The ministry said one gunman had been killed and a second captured following a security-forces operation in the popular seaside resort.
A Tunisian student from Kairouan, armed with a Kalashnikov rifle, led the attack inside a hotel. He was killed soon after opening fire in retaliatory action by security personnel, Xinhua reported citing the Interior Ministry.
The city of Sousse, 140 km south of capital Tunis, is one of the most prominent tourist destinations in the country. Since the Arab Spring revolution, there was one terrorist attempt outside a hotel in the region.
The Islamic State militant group had called on its followers to increase attacks during the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan, but no one has yet claimed responsibility for Friday’s attack.
An attempt at achieving higher casualties failed when the suicide bomber prematurely detonated his device before even reaching the hotel gate.
The North African nation has been battered by militant attacks. In March, two Tunisians returning from Libya killed 22 people at the national Bardo Museum.